The rapping on the door intensified; whoever was outside was both impatient and quite possibly angry.
‘Dr Green!’
‘Uh, um, just one second, I just woke up, hold on!’
‘Quickly, Doctor.’
There was a grating harshness in the muffled voice.
Margaret heaved herself out of bed, ran a few fingers through her mousy, limp hair to straighten it out as much as she could, and then stepped onto the floor, sucking in a quick breath as the cold stone sank its icy fangs into the soles of her feet.
‘All right,’ she called out, ‘come on in.’
The key turned in the lock and the door swung open. The lanky, grim-faced teenage girl who had stood guard outside a few times before strode in carrying a platter of food and water, which she set down on the desk without so much as even looking at Margaret.
‘Your breakfast, Dr Green,’ she said brusquely, and then she marched straight back out of the room, not deigning to give Margaret even a single glance.
‘Wait a sec!’ Margaret blurted out. ‘Where’s Sergeant Tesla?’
The girl stopped in her tracks and shot a cold look over her shoulder.
‘Why do you want to know about Sergeant Tesla’s whereabouts?’
It was more an accusation than a question, and the words were prickly with barbs.
‘I, well, I just, the General himself said that, that Sergeant Tesla was supposed to keep me company,’ she stammered in reply.
‘Sergeant Tesla is busy training at the moment. As of this morning, by special order from the General himself, all soldiers have been ordered to double up their training routines. Sergeant Tesla will be busy all day and will not be coming here, and that’s all the information I’m prepared to share with you. If there’s an emergency, knock on the door. Myself or another soldier will be standing guard outside. Good-day, Dr Green.’
‘But—’
The girl began to close the door.
‘I said good-day,’ she growled. She then shut the door swiftly, and with a sinking feeling Margaret heard the sound of the key turning in the latch.
‘Shit!’ she hissed under her breath. ‘Shit shit shit shit shit!’
She had no idea what she going to do now. Cold sweat oozed through her pores, its chill mirroring the trickle of panic-laden blood through her veins.
It’s my only chance, Jesus H. Christ, my only chance to escape! God, if Tesla isn’t able to come tonight, I’m done for! The barrels will be sent downriver tomorrow night at midnight, and then all hope is lost! Then I’ll be stuck here in this fucking prison until that psychotic monster does whatever it is he intends to do with me. Oh Lord, oh Jesus! What the hell am I gonna do?! Just yesterday it seemed as if everything was working out, as if it had all fallen perfectly into place … and now, with one order from that damned lunatic, everything has gone to shit! Everything! Damn it! Shit! God damn it!
Margaret fell back onto the bed, sprawling her arms out and staring blankly at the ceiling for a long time. The only thought running through her head was that she was trapped, that the entire plan had fallen apart, that her one and only opportunity for escape had slipped through her fingers. The helplessness she felt was devastating in its severity, its weight as that of a twenty foot anaconda wrapping its suffocating coils around her, squeezing every last breath of hope out of her and pulverising every bone in her body, crushing every last structure of hope into dust.
She turned her head to the bedside table, with the hardcover copy of Fritjof Capra’s The Web of Life, inside the cover of which she had hidden the crushed-up Phenergan tablets. With this throttling, claustrophobic sense of despair that blanketed her every sense, she felt like simply dumping the powder into the toilet and flushing it away.
Or, perhaps, using it on herself.
Through the hopelessness, however, a stabbing lance of light burst like sudden sunshine through a bank of storm clouds.
‘No! No!’ she growled. ‘You can’t give up now! You have to do something to get out of this damn room tonight and get down to the river. There has to be some way to do it. There has to be!’
She sat up in the bed and slapped her own face. Then she slapped herself again, harder this time, so that the heat of the sting throbbed harshly in her cheeks.
‘You’re weak,’ she hissed through clenched teeth. ‘Weak, weak, weak and pathetic! Stop it now. Stop it! Stop it! Wake up Margaret! Wake the hell up, you pathetic piece of shit! Ting needs you! The puppies need you! You will, I repeat, you will get the hell out of this shithole tonight!’
She got up, her jaw set with vicious determination, and then walked over to the window and began to scheme.
***
By nightfall, however, she had come no closer to figuring out an alternative escape plan. She had even gone back inside the secret passage, following it to its terminus, which had turned out to be a dead end, sealed up by a rockfall. Wherever the passage had once led to, it did not matter; the way was blocked. She had tried to move a few of the stones, but they had simply been too large and heavy.
In the end, despite her intense determination, Margaret had been forced to concede that there was little she could do about her predicament without the help of Sergeant Tesla. She had eventually resigned herself to temporary defeat and had decided to temporarily alleviate her despair by doing what she often did under such circumstances – getting drunk. She had knocked on the door and asked the guard for two bottles of wine, which were duly brought to her.
‘Thanks for the wine,’ Margaret said nervously as she took the bottles from the guard. She could feel the girl’s judgmental gaze boring holes into her skull with its accusatory heat. From the way she was staring at the
